


Given To Grace

by paradiamond



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Established Matt/Foggy, F/M, Karen centric, M/M, Matt POV, Multi, Post Season 1, Religion, but nothing explicit, developing Matt/Foggy/Karen, falling apart karen, kick ass karen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-23
Updated: 2017-08-23
Packaged: 2018-12-19 01:44:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11887296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paradiamond/pseuds/paradiamond
Summary: In the aftermath of Fisk, Matt gets fed up with waiting for everything to fall into place. His relationship with Foggy sits on a stronger foundation, the firm is doing well, but it feels like Karen is coming apart at the seams. He finds out why.





	Given To Grace

**Author's Note:**

> The extent to which they haven't addressed everything that happened with Karen in season 1 seems...weird to me. So here we are. Religion, polyamory, etc. Enjoy!

It’s early on a Tuesday and Karen is already at the office. Matt knows because he’s there too, but instead of going inside he’s loitering in the hallway, listening to her sing. It’s a quiet song, but Karen’s voice carries to him easily. 

Matt smiles and leans against the wall, letting himself rest against it. He likes listening to Karen’s voice. After the night he’d had, he appreciates it even more. He especially enjoys hearing Karen’s voice now, given how quiet she’d been lately. 

Things haven’t been the same since they caught Fisk, some of it for the better. His relationship with Foggy, which had been on the verge of complete collapse, had been fortified, bringing them together stronger than ever. But Karen had been quieter, more prone to awkwardness and tense silences. It doesn’t rest easily on Matt’s nerves, but he can’t figure out how to fix it. 

It’s not lost on him that this is one issue he can’t solve by punching his way through it, and so he doesn’t know how to move forward. 

Matt sighs when Karen’s voice abruptly cuts off, trailing into a heavy silence. Papers shuffle, her phone buzzes. She doesn’t pick the song back up again. He leans his head against the cool of the wall for a moment more before straightening up and heading for the door, ready to pretend to be surprised to find her there so early. Ready to lie some more to someone he deeply cares about. 

He’s frowning when he opens the door, and Karen jumps. 

“Matt, hey! You’re here early,” Karen says, and he can hear the smile in her voice, forced or not. 

He smiles back. “Yeah, I wanted to get a jump on the day. Any calls?” 

“Nope, it’s uh, been pretty quiet,” Karen replies, which is only a little untrue. Her singing had filled the air, made everything sweet and kind for a while before she stopped. Matt nods anyway. 

“Good.” 

Karen makes an agreeable sound and shifts in her seat. Not wanting to make her uncomfortable by standing over her in silence, Matt heads into his office. He prefers the conference table where they can work together, but there’s no reason for him to be in there right now. Still, he leaves his door open. 

Just as he’s sitting down, he hears Karen stand. 

“Oh!” she calls out, gathering up what sounds like a stack of paper. “Sorry Matt, I was putting these in the database last night, but I know I probably shouldn’t move your things without telling you.” 

“Probably not, but I hadn’t even noticed they were gone yet.” Matt calls back. “Are they the McDermont files?”

“Yes.” Karen appears in his doorway, a soft flame in an otherwise dark landscape. She walks over to his desk and Matt sticks his hand out reflexively. Then he frowns. There’s something strange about the way she’s moving. 

“Are you hurt?” Matt asks before it occurs to him that maybe he shouldn’t, that he shouldn’t be able to tell. Karen freezes, the files hanging in the air between them. 

“I- no?” she responds, and Matt would know that it’s a lie even without hearing her heart jump in her chest. His picks up right along with it as he lets him arm drop, already imagining every horrible reason, every dark possibility they should have been safe from by now. 

“I don’t mean to pry,” Matt says, carefully. “You just- you sound like you’re limping. Is everything alright?” 

Really she sounds like she has a few good bruises under her clothes that are making it hard for her stand up straight and act normally, which kind of sounds like a limp. Karen’s hand flies to her side, fingers dancing over what Matt assumes is the worst one, and Karen assumes Matt can’t perceive. 

“Oh well I, I might have gotten a bruise walking into something. It’s fine. Here are your files,” she says in a rush and sets them down on his desk, right next to his left hand. He doesn’t move to pick them up as she turns to leave.

“Karen?” 

She freezes and doesn’t turn back around, probably thinking that he doesn’t know that either. “It’s really fine, Matt.” 

“Is it?” he asks, his voice sharper than necessary. “Did you fall down some steps?” 

That gets her to turn around. Matt can feel her gaze on him like a physical weight. “It’s always ok when you have bruises, Matt, why wouldn’t it be fine for me?” 

It’s Matt’s turn to freeze, like a deer caught in a hunter’s crosshairs. “I didn’t realize you were _blind_ too Karen, maybe-”

She scoffs. “Don’t give me that.” 

“Then you don’t give me this. What happened?” 

Karen sucks in a sharp breath, and for a moment Matt has a vision of their first ever yelling match that Foggy will probably walk in on at some point, but then she lets it out and moves to lean against his desk. Matt follows, setting himself down next to her. 

“Nothing happened, it’s just embarrassing.” 

Matt wants to reach out and touch her, but he doesn’t. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. It’s an...athletic injury. Don’t tell Foggy, please.” 

“Athletic?”

“Self defense. I’m trying to learn.” 

“Oh,” Matt says, and it’s such a simple explanation it makes him want to laugh. 

Karen does laugh. “Yeah, I know.” 

“What kind?” 

“It’s just a basic class, free at the rec center, that sort of thing. You know how it is.” 

Matt hums, he does know, but his fingers itch to show her something better, something worth her time. The person teaching that class probably means well, but Matt is sure that he could do better. Not that he can tell Karen that. 

“Stop, drop, and roll?” Matt jokes and Karen bumps his shoulder with hers. 

“Strike, scream, and run, actually.” 

“That sounds right, yeah. Why were you embarrassed? This is a smart move.” 

“Well I missed my target by a long shot and fell right onto the instructor’s knee, so that was pretty bad,” Karen says, openly giggling now. 

Matt grins. “You’ll get better.” 

“What I’m getting is a gun,” she says, some steel coming into her voice, and Matt lets the smile drop. 

“Really?” 

When she responds, Karen’s voice is strained, but strong. “The next time someone jumps me, I want to be able to deal with it.” 

“Well I’ll be sure not to surprise you in any dark alleys,” Matt says, trying to return the conversation to a light level as Foggy walks through the door.

“Dark alleys?” Foggy calls out. “I don’t know what that’s about but sign me up.” 

Karen jumps up and away from the desk like she’s been burned, but Matt can tell that she’s smiling again. He listens to them banter, moving around their little office as a unit, going from kitchen to desk to doorway, Foggy dogging her steps, hovering around her. He must see it too. Matt sits back down in his chair and picks up the files she had brought him, running his fingers over the braille without absorbing much of the content. 

Karen is bright and caring and still has that shadow over her. She was there for Matt when he needed someone the most, and he knows he has to be there for her now. 

***

“I’m worried about Karen.” 

Foggy sighs and rubs his hand over his face. “Me too.” 

They’re sitting in Foggy’s kitchen space, half eaten food spread out between them. There’s too much of it for two. Karen was supposed to join them but she backed out at the last minute. Matt feels her absence like a physical presence. 

He drums his fingers on the table and frowns. “Is this what it’s like when I don’t show up?”

“Yes.” 

“Sorry.”

“Are you? No- never mind.” Foggy waves a hand. “Let’s not get side tracked. You’re here now and this is about Karen.” 

“Right,” Matt says, privately resolving to do something very nice for Foggy, who has gone above and beyond in the boyfriend department for over a year, in the very near future. “Did you know she’s getting a gun?”

Foggy sighs. “No. Did you know she’s trying to pray?” 

Matt frowns and stops fidgeting. “What?”

“You first.” 

“She came to the office with a bruise.”

“Yeah, I saw that.”

Matt’s eyebrows fly up. “You saw her stomach?” 

“No, her arm,” Foggy says, slowly. “She had this circle, but she said someone just grabbed her too hard and she has sensitive skin.” 

“Does she?” 

Foggy shrugs. “Probably. She’s very like, fair, I guess you call it. Really white. It makes sense she would mark up easily.” 

Matt hums, filing this away. “She been taking self defense.”

“Good.”

“That’s what I said, but it was difficult getting it out of her. She’s embarrassed.” 

“Why?”

“I guess she’s not doing very well at it,” Matt says, drumming his fingers against the counter again. 

“Uh huh. I guess you want to help?” 

Matt grimaces. “Of course I do, but I can’t. She doesn’t-”

“So tell her.”

“Do we really have to have this conversation again?” 

“Fine.” Foggy puts his hands in the air. “But you have no sympathy from me for the problems you make for yourself, not anymore. Especially because I’m pretty sure she’ll love it. She’s always been a Devil fan.” 

“Not everyone is as forgiving as you Foggy.” Matt rolls his eyes. “But that’s fair. Now, what’s this about her praying?” 

Foggy sighs. “Yeah, that was weird, and kind of upsetting.” 

“Why? It actually helps some of us, you know.” 

“Oh I know, but this did not sound all that helpful.” Foggy runs a hand through his hair. A nervous habit. Matt fidgets, not liking where this is going. It’s never a good sign when Foggy is nervous. He’s so perceptive, so good with people that he’s almost always right. 

“We were walking home, very drunk, and I was pretty much down and out. Usually I walk her home because it makes us both feel better and it’s something I’ve always done, but my place was right there because we were trying a new bar.” Foggy waves a hand in the air, seemingly at himself. “Anyway, she crashed at my place and insisted on taking the couch because of feminism and how she knows I don’t sleep well outside of my own bed.”

Matt smiles reflexively despite his worry. “Right.” 

“Right, so, you know the bathroom is inside my room, so she had to go through it to get there, which woke me up. So I’m awake and she starts running the sink for a long time, and I think she’s just really drunk and not paying attention so I get up to go get her, but then I’m closer to the door and I can hear her crying, and then she starts talking.”

“Praying.”

“Yeah. It was a mess. Mostly she just apologized to god a lot, which seemed like kind of a red flag.” 

“Yeah, that’s not a good sign,” Matt says quietly, imagining it. Karen on her knees in Foggy’s tiny bathroom, holding her chest or maybe with her hands pressed together. Shaking, crying. He closes his hand into a fist and squeezes, grounding himself. 

“Right,” Foggy continues, not sounding so happy himself. “So I knocked on the door and she came out after a while and tried to play it off. Her face was all red and she looked _bad_ Matt.” 

“Did she say why?”

Foggy shakes his head. “No. She just said she was drunk and missing home. But I really don’t think that was it.” 

“Neither do I.” Matt shakes his head back. “I didn’t even know Karen believed in God.” 

“She doesn’t, or didn’t, I guess. I asked her one Saturday if she needed to take it easy for church the next morning and she said she hadn’t been since she was a kid and that she didn’t believe in it.” 

Matt tilts his head. “Then why-”

“I don’t know buddy. I don’t know.” 

Matt sighs and turns his head, trying to focus and control his breathing. There’s nothing he can do right now, and he knows that, but his instincts are telling him to run, to go fix it. The devil inside him doesn’t know that you can’t fight your way through someone else’s demons. 

“It smells like her in here,” Matt says, just to have something nice to say. 

Foggy hums. “That makes sense. She stays here a lot.” 

“How often is a lot?”

“It’s a lot, Matt. I don’t think she likes to go home, not even now.” 

Matt thinks about finding her in the office time after time, bruised and cutting songs short. Thinks about her finding refuge at Foggy’s place, of trying to reach out to God. 

“We can help her, right?”

“Course.” 

Matt shakes his head. “How?”

“Just be here, Matt. That’s all you can do.” 

Anger bubbles up in him again, the desire to take action. He fights it down, unclenches his fist, not really relaxing until Foggy’s hand lands on his, thumb drawing circles against his scarred skin. 

“Ok.” 

It doesn’t occur to Matt to be jealous of either of them until later, when he’s all alone in his own apartment. It’s not really normal for a boyfriend to spend this much time with someone else, especially not his gorgeous, vulnerable secretary. Foggy spends more time with Karen than with him, Matt realizes, and that probably means something. 

Even then, the concept doesn’t sit well with him. It could make sense for him to be jealous, Foggy is his, but he can’t help but feel like he’s Karen’s too. Maybe that’s ok. 

***

Matt makes an effort. He still patrols, still keeps the city safe, but less manically now that Fisk is gone. He eats better in the effort to get Karen to eat at all. He goes out with his friends, spends the precious time to let Karen know that he’s there if she needs him. 

Karen clearly notices, but she never asks him for help. It hurts, the way she’ll lean on Foggy but not on him, not the way Matt leaned on her a few short weeks ago, but it makes sense. He hasn’t been around in the same way, he hadn’t earned it. 

He’s here now, listening to her pick at her own nails and skin, tearing herself apart piece by piece. He hears her tapping her feet, nervous energy bursting forth. The worst is the absence of sound, the way she sometimes sits in silence and stillness for long minutes at a time, barely even breathing. If Matt couldn't hear her heart, he wouldn't know she was there at all. 

Still, Matt pays attention, and it pays off. Guilt he understands. He can work with guilt. 

“Do you have any plans for the weekend, boss?” Karen asks as they pack up on Friday, both going slower than they have to. Foggy is still on the phone in his office and they don’t leave without at least all saying goodbye. 

Matt grasps the opportunity immediately, his head snapping up. “Just church.”

“Oh. Right.” Karen slings her bag onto her shoulder. 

“You could come if you want, you’re always welcome,” he says, hopefully more casually than he feels. The only way to earn God’s forgiveness is to go see him, and he wants that for Karen, no matter what she thinks she’s done wrong. 

“Come to church? Oh, I-”

Matt waves a hand. “It’s just an invitation, not an evangelism. Let me know and I can pick you up, otherwise I’m sure we can think of something more traditional to do this weekend.” 

Karen laughs and it’s only a little strained. “Isn’t church pretty traditional?” 

Matt chuckles. “Yeah I guess it is. Not so much for our generation though. Not like karaoke.” 

Karen gasps. “We could do that!” 

His hand fly up in mock surrender. “I didn’t meant that as a serious suggestion.”

“Come on, it could be fun.”

“Are you sure? You’ve heard Foggy sing right?”

Karen giggles. “Nothing a little alcohol can’t fix. Besides, I haven’t heard you sing.” 

“Oh I’m worse than Foggy. Doesn’t matter anyway, karaoke games don’t come in braille.” 

Karen hums, and then claps her hands. “So you can sing something you have memorized, or I could teach you!” 

Foggy’s door opens. “Matt singing? That’ll be the day.”

Matt grins at her. “See?” 

Karen sniffs. “Well either we all sing, or no one does, and I personally like to sing.” 

“Far be it from me to stop you,” Matt says, personally feeling like he would do anything to hear her sing again. Even if it means that he has to sing too. 

Foggy groans. “Really Matt?” 

In the end, they don’t go to karaoke, but Karen sings them scraps from a few songs as they walk back from Josie’s in the rain. Matt brings up the rear with Foggy, smiling and not even feeling guilty about missing a night of patrol. Rain isn’t as bad as ice but it’s still murder on his ability to get around. Nothing like wet metal to send him right off the edge of a roof. 

They go home, to Foggy’s home, still together, and he forgets the sirens for the night. He forgets Karen’s silences because he can hear her quiet snores. He forgets their conversation entirely until he wakes up to find her awake too, and on her knees. 

“Please,” she whispers. “Please.”

Matt sighs and extricates himself from Foggy’s arms and gets out of the bed, crossing the room silently and coming to a stop in the open doorway. “Karen?”

She jumps, scrambling to her feet. “Matt?”

“You ok?” 

Silence rings between them, the dead kind Matt is getting used to. He rubs a hand over his face and walks into the room, deftly avoiding familiar obstacles to feel his way to the couch. He can tell that Karen is watching him the whole way. 

She tries to step out of his way when he gets close but he reaches out and takes her hand, pulls her down with him to the couch. They settle close, but not quite on top of each other. Karen’s heart is thrumming with some strong emotion, maybe shame. Maybe guilt.

“Are you coming to church on Sunday?”

She runs her thumb along the curve of his hand. “I don’t know.”

“Do you want to?”

“Yes,” she whispers. 

Matt tugs her closer, pulling them down to lie flat on the couch, Karen on top. “Then come.” 

“Ok,” she says sleepily, curling further into his chest. The blanket is underneath them, but neither of them move to get it. Matt likes being able to feel her heart at the same time that he hears it, slowing down down to rest. 

Matt closes his eyes, ready to rest too.

***

Church makes Karen nervous. 

Matt can tell by the way she moves, clearly trying to make herself as small and quiet as possible. She doesn’t feel like she belongs and doesn’t know yet that everyone does. Foggy is there too, which helps, but even though she does a decent job of hiding it from the rest of the parish, Matt can tell. 

“When’s the last time you were in a church Foggy?” Karen asks as they sit down, Karen in the middle, her voice pitched far lower than it has to be. 

Foggy laughs, maybe a little louder than he should. “Oh it’s been a while.” 

“Years, probably,” Matt comments mildly, smiling. The atmosphere is light, despite the weight of the building. There’s a family with kids in the row behind them, and an older couple in the row in front, talking quietly about the church choir drama. No sirens. 

“It’s very beautiful,” she murmurs, and Matt’s pretty sure she's looking up at the ceiling. 

“Thousands of years of accumulating wealth and power gets you some nice buildings, yeah,” Foggy mutters back, getting Karen to laugh softly. Matt rolls his eyes but then Father Lantom steps up to the pulpit, so he doesn’t comment. 

Unlike some of the priests Matt has had over the years, Father Lantom is not generally a long winded man. He always keeps his services short by Catholic standards, though it will probably still feels long to Karen and Foggy. All eyes turn to him in a way that Matt can feel rather than see, and he sits up a little straighter as Father Lantom starts to speak. 

“Good morning. I’d like to start today by welcoming you all,” he says, and pauses for the murmured and scattered responses. Matt feels Karen turn her head, clearly wondering if she’s supposed to do something. Foggy doesn’t move. 

“It can be difficult in this world to know what to do. Sometimes, it seems like even the Bible is confusing, contradictory. On the one hand we have, ‘Like a muddied spring or a polluted fountain is a righteous man who gives way before the wicked,’ from Proverbs 25:26. But we also have, ‘Do not say, “I will repay evil”; wait for the Lord, and he will deliver you,’ from Proverbs 20:22.” Lantom pauses, letting the words settle in. 

“Both from proverbs! Is God being confusing on purpose here? Is he trying to make us think critically on his Word? Or is it the fault of the translators, the interpreters, that we have this apparent contradiction?” 

Karen shifts in her seat, prompting Matt to slip his hand into hers without a thought. She squeezes back, her slight fingers surprisingly strong. 

“What of the warrior saints? What should we think of those like Joan of Arch? Or Saint George? He’s an interesting figure. Not that the others aren’t! But Saint George has the patronage of many things. Archers, armourers, cavalry, chivalry, horsemen, horses, knights, and soldiers, but also sheep; shepherds, field workers, and farmers. How can this be? Are these not conflicting concepts?” 

Someone coughs. A phone vibrates. Father Lantom pushes on. 

“God speaks of hammering plowshares into swords and turning the other cheek in the same breath! What are we to make of this? I see many of you looking at me for the answer, but I am just the interpreter. You must look to the author,” he says, emphatic in the way that all priests are, and points up at the ceiling. 

Matt doesn’t need his senses to know that. He feels the tug, the lift up to the ceiling. Lantom is quiet for a long moment. 

“My advice is, don’t get bogged down in the details. It’s the essence that matters. What’s right is not always clearly definable, but that doesn’t mean that it does not exist. As the Lord says in Ephesians 6:12, ‘For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.’ Take from that what you will, I cannot tell you what to feel, only whom to look to for your example,” he crosses himself. “In Jesus’ name.” 

“Amen,” Matt intones with the rest of the crowd. Next to him, Karen mutters it back, a step behind. 

The rest of the service passes with little drama or innovation. Matt finds himself preoccupied as he kneels, and even still when he takes communion, wondering about Saint George the dragon slayer. He can’t begin to guess Karen’s thoughts. When it ends, they wait for Foggy outside. Karen fidgets, her hand still wrapped in Matt’s. 

“What did you think?” Matt asks because he can’t help it. He wants to know everything about Karen sometimes. He needs to know if this helped her, if it can in the future. 

“Matt I don’t want you to think, I mean, I’m not even sure I…” Karen trails off. Pressed close as they are on the small bench, Matt can feel her shift around uncomfortably. 

“I know,” Matt says and reaches over to touch her hand, trying to bring her some ease. She’s so tense he’s worried she might snap. “I’m not trying to convert you Karen, I’m just trying to help.” 

“I know,” she responds quietly, but relaxes by inches. “I just don’t want you to think that I’m, using you? Using this? I don’t know.” 

Matt shrugs. “This is for everyone, and it works differently for everyone. It’s none of my business if you believe in God Karen, that’s between you and Him. I just know that you’re having a hard time and this is what helps me.” 

Karen hums and leans over to lay her head on his shoulder. “Thank you.” 

“Anytime,” Matt says, and means it. 

***

“You have to tell her,” Foggy says from across Matt’s room, out of the blue. 

Matt raises his head from where he’s methodically tying his shoes. “What?” 

“You can either have your secret, or you can have Karen, but you can’t have both.”

“What?”

“You heard me.” 

Matt frowns, realizing that he’s serious and that he’s also putting Karen above Matt when he never would have done that in the past. She had changed both of them, made a space for herself in both their lives. 

“What do you mean I can have Karen? I have you.” It sounds like a lie even as he says it. 

He must be making a face because Foggy laughs. 

“Come on, don’t pretend like we don’t both see where this is going.” 

Matt hesitates, licking his lip, picking at his sleeve. “Have you- did you two have sex?” 

Foggy hesitates and Matt’s heart jumps into his throat with imagining. It’s not even hard, not after the way he treated him, treated them both. His previous lack of jealousy seems far away, not so much in the wake of Karen and Foggy being that close, but from the idea that Foggy hadn’t told him, and had known Karen like that while Matt was still so far behind, only seeing her in pieces.

But Foggy shakes his head. “No.” 

Matt nods, resting his elbows on his knees. “Not yet, you mean.” 

“Notice I’m talking to you about it now. Besides, you had Claire.” 

“Were we still technically together at that point?” Matt asks, calming down somewhat. “Also, I didn’t _have_ Claire.” 

Foggy snickers. “Don’t talk about a lady like that.” 

“You started it,” Matt shoots back, relaxing as Foggy walks closer, almost within reach. 

“Sure. Also, you have to actually communicate with someone to break up with them. By that standard we’ve been together for years.”

Matt smiles in his direction. “Maybe that was my plan all along.” 

“Sap,” Foggy says fondly. Then his hand lands on Matt’s shoulder. “Seriously though Matt, don’t do what you did to me to her too. If you do, I’m going to have to assume that your apology didn’t mean anything.” 

Matt winces. “It did.” 

“Great.” Foggy leans down and presses his lips lightly against Matt’s. It doesn’t feel particularly sexual, more like a promise, and so familiar it hurts. “Show me, please.” 

***

Karen takes to it kind of strangely. 

At first, she’s silent. Matt stands a few feet away from her in her tiny apartment and tries not to fidget, his mask clenched in his hand. It’s not lost on him that he’d never been here before as himself, only as Daredevil. It’s probably not lost on her either. There’s a lot going on down on the street, and two floors up, someone is getting broken up with. Karen is breathing slowly, but steadily. 

Eventually, she moves. Matt mentally follows the motion of her arm, moving up to her hair, the strands shifting between her fingers. She shifts her weight to the other foot and sighs. “I can’t do this right now.”

Matt frowns. “Oh, ok, I-” 

“Please go.” 

He goes.

When he gets to his apartment, he sits on the couch for about an hour, pretending that Karen is going to call him. Of course, she won’t. She's more likely to call Foggy, or worse, no one at all. Matt shifts forward and rests his elbows on his knees. Then he gets up, and gets to work. 

It's easier to think as Daredevil. His focus is sharper, his goals clear. 

The night is quiet, relatively speaking. He stops one minor mugging and follows a group of teenage girls from roof to roof to make sure they make it home safe. The sirens indicate minor fire, accidental injury. Satisfied, he gives himself permission and goes to see how Karen is, which as it turns out, is not great. 

She hadn’t ranged far from her apartment, only going as far as the roof. Matt climbs up the fire escape, not bothering to stay quiet. When he reaches the top, he climbs the highest window and grabs the ledge , hauling himself up but staying there, suspended over the ground. 

“Karen? Can I come up? You can say no, I just thought we should talk.” 

Karen watches him in silence from across the roof. She shifts, and Matt realizes there’s a gun in the waistband of her pants. He grins. “Going to shoot me?” 

That cracks the dam. She huffs out a little laugh and shifts to cross her arms over her chest. “No _Daredevil_ , I’m not.” 

Matt bobs his head, his arms starting to shake from holding himself so awkwardly. “Thanks I appreciate that.” 

“You’d just dodge it anyway.” 

“Hopefully, but it’s the thought that counts,” Matt responds, and gives up, pulling himself up and onto the ledge to squat instead, but keeping off the roof. 

Karen laughs. “The floor isn’t lava. You can come over here.” 

Matt drops onto the roof and walks over, slowly. He tries to move normally, like he always does, but it’s difficult to join something he’d worked so hard to separate. Karen watches him the whole way, her focus like a physical force. 

“Foggy’s right,” she says when he gets within a few feet. “It is a bit much.” 

Matt laughs. “I don’t get a pass for being blind?”

“Not at the rate you’re going,” Karen teases back, apparently finding it easier to talk to him like this. 

He nods. “That’s fair. Did you talk to Foggy?” 

“Yeah. Thanks for not doing the big reveal in a puddle of blood, by the way.” 

“Ouch.”

“That’s what Foggy said.” 

Matt sighs and leans against the ledge. “Yeah. I know.” 

“Would you have told me if he hadn’t told you to?”

“Probably not, at least not until-” Matt cuts himself off, not sure he wants to tell her about the conversation he’d had with Foggy, the things that had been implied. 

“Until I found out?”

“No. Until you became...more involved. With me. Or Foggy. If you do, I mean, you obviously don’t have to do any-” 

“Matt, I’m not-” Karen stops, shakes her head. “I’ve been having a hard time, but I don’t want you to think that I’m trying to steal your boyfriend, or anything, that’s not-” 

“I know, it’s not about that.” 

“It sort of sounds like it is.” 

He shakes his head, confused as to how they had gotten to this point. “That’s not- we don’t have to talk about this right now. You’ve had a lot thrown at you recently, including this.” Matt gestures to himself, hoping to get Karen to laugh, which she doesn’t. “I really came here to ask you if you wanted to learn how to fight properly. I know you’ve been trying.” 

Karen catches her breath. “Oh.” 

“Yeah. I wanted to offer before, when I found out you were taking lessons, but I couldn’t.” 

“That would be really good, actually.” 

Matt reaches out hesitantly, his hand hanging in the air before Karen leans forward, allowing him to take her arm. “Let’s do that then. We can worry about the rest later.” 

Karen nods, and some of the coiled up tension in her frame unwinds. “Ok.” 

***

The door to Matt’s apartment opens, startling Matt out of his thoughts. He whirls, but it’s only Foggy making use of his key. Matt makes himself relax as Foggy comes around the corner, spotting him in the kitchen immediately. 

“Hey,” Foggy says, and there’s something troubling in the tone of his voice. 

Matt frowns and gets up to get Foggy a beer. “Karen?” 

“Yeah.” Foggy accepts it but doesn’t take a drink. Matt sits back down, his spine straight and his stomach churning. He wants to reach out and touch Foggy, have him close. Foggy beats him to it, wrapping his hand around Matt’s knee and squeezing. 

“She hasn’t seemed as bad,” Matt says, irrationally putting off the ultimate point. “I’ve been training her.” 

“I know. I could tell.” 

A stab of fear hits Matt right between the ribs. He grabs at Foggy’s shoulders, his chest, his back. “Are you hurt?” he demands, but still a little relieved knowing that Foggy wouldn’t be here if Karen was. 

Foggy waves a hand but doesn’t push Matt away. “No, neither is Karen. Just shaken up.” 

“But you were attacked.” 

“Yeah.” Foggy finally takes a drink from his beer. “Just some kid, looking for a few bucks. Probably a hundred pounds soaking wet, but he had a knife.” 

Matt nods, still attached to Foggy. He can picture it. The knife, probably cheap and small. Foggy and Karen torn between annoyance and fear. The scramble to just give him what he wants to get him away from them, the adrenaline crash afterwards. 

“She demolished him.” 

Matt freezes. “What?” 

“Karen. She hurt him. Smacked the knife out of his hand and then kept going. I don’t think it would have worked most of the time but the kid was so startled she got the jump on him.” 

“I- wow.” 

“Yeah. I think she broke his hand. By stepping on it.” 

“He was on the ground?” 

“Oh yeah. She kneed him good in the stomach or balls, I don’t know, I was kicking the knife away when she did it. But then she stomped on him.”

Matt shakes his head. This he can’t picture at first. Karen had shown a decent aptitude for self defense, but that was all. He makes the image fit, overlaying the movements he had practiced with her with some more savage colors. 

“She looked...bad. Really shook up but also really calm. It wasn’t good.” 

“Alright.” Matt gets up, determined to find the logic and falling back on his own pragmatism instead. “Do we need to be worried? Did you call the police?” 

“No. It’s not exactly my first instinct nowadays,” Foggy jokes, his version of coping coming out to play with Matt’s. “I’m really worried about her. This isn’t normal anymore.” 

“No, it isn’t,” Matt says, pacing back and forth. Foggy catches his hand on the third pass and reels him back into the v of his legs. 

“Go find her. Talk to her.” 

Matt nods. “Yeah we should-” 

“Not we. You. I don’t understand this.” 

“You think I do?” 

“Rage? Yeah. Call it the devil if you want, but it’s a human thing. You have it, and now Karen needs you.” 

Matt leans in closer, loath to pull away. “You’re right.” 

“Usually am,” Foggy says, and smooths Matt’s hair away from his forehead. Then he leans up and kisses Matt’s lips, lightly. Matt presses back, the hum of pleasant energy like a ray of sun escaping from behind the clouds only to be swallowed up again. 

Matt straightens up, and goes. 

***

Tracking works well when Matt either knows basically where his target is headed, or where they’ll likely be. Trying to find Karen in the middle of the day in the city only drives home the point that he doesn’t really know her anymore. The revelation is more sobering than terrifying, which is probably why Foggy sent him instead of going himself. Matt can pull himself through hell and get there just fine because he’s used to it. It doesn’t make not finding Karen any easier. 

It’s only when he gives up that he succeeds. 

Matt crosses the threshold of his church with a frown, ready to sit and think until enough time has passed to reasonably go back out to find Karen again. The familiar press of the building draws up around him in a physical hold, keeping his pieces together. Quiet voices, the scent of candles, the brush of eyes from the statues and stained glass he can’t see but can surely feel. 

“Hello, Matt.” 

Matt turns. “Father.” 

There’s a long pause where Father Lantom is very obviously looking him over. He sighs. “You don’t look any better than she did.” 

He might as well have pulled out a taser and shocked him. Matt scrambles to attention. “Karen? She was here? Is she-” 

A hand lands heavy on his shoulder. “Seal of confession Matthew. Last I saw she went around to the garden.” 

Confession? Matt shakes himself. “Thank you,” he manages around a dry mouth, and the hand lets him go. 

Matt’s legs feel unsteady as he walks towards the side exit, strangely almost the same feeling as intense blood loss. He pauses at the door, wondering when the last time he ate was and if that might be why, but then he hears her. 

Karen is sobbing in the back gardens, bent over, her hands gripping the concrete bench far too tightly. Matt makes a beeline for her, uncaring of appearing properly blind. It doesn’t matter, Karen’s crying had driven away anyone who might have been around and she doesn’t notice him until he’s right on top of her. Then she jumps.

“Matt!” She gets to her feet, as unsteady as Matt feels. Her voice is a wreak, raspy and weak. “What are you-” 

It’s too much. He wraps his arms around her shoulders, pulling her close to his chest. She stiffens, then bends, folding into him, her face pressed to his neck. It’s achingly familiar to when she had done this for him back in the office when Matt was falling to pieces. Except this time Matt doesn’t know what he has to do. He still doesn’t even know what’s wrong. 

They hold onto each other until Karen cries herself out. Thankfully, Matt’s sympathetic crying reflex doesn’t kick in. Maybe he’s too confused to cry, maybe it’s too important to be steady for her. Either way, he holds her up until she’s done, and guides her back down to the bench, his arm still wrapped around her shoulder. If Karen minds, or even notices, she doesn’t give any indication. 

Karen settles in, frighteningly still and quiet. Nothing seems to be better, not the way it should be after that kind of release. Matt rubs at her back, at a loss. Foggy was wrong, he’s not the right person for this. He needs Foggy here, needs his softness, his understanding. Matt bites the inside of his mouth, trying to figure out how to get her back to the apartment without setting her off again when Karen suddenly speaks. 

“How did you know I was here?” 

It’s at least an easy question. Matt takes a deep breath, making sure he’s steady for her. “I didn’t. I was feeling lost.” 

“Oh.” 

She doesn’t say ‘me too.’ 

Matt hums and keeps stroking her back, moving from shoulder blade to shoulder blade in slow, precise movements. 

“I guess Foggy told you what happened.” 

“Yes. Did confession help?” 

“No,” Karen wipes as her face, despair turning to anger in a way Matt finds too familiar. “I couldn’t tell him.” 

“It’s not that bad. It was self defense,” Matt says, lowering his voice to lie to her on church grounds.

Karen is silent again. Her heart rate has slowed back to a normal rate, and Matt is loath to say anything that will set her off again. Would she follow him to a cab? He can hear the cars only a few feet away, past the fence. She can probably hear them too, a reminder of how artificial the physical sanctuary of the church really is. 

“Hey, Matt?” 

“Yeah?” 

“When you-” she cuts herself off, her teeth clicking together with a jarring sound. Matt waits, his hand frozen on her back. Eventually, she comes back, her voice at the barest whisper. “Has Daredevil ever killed anyone?” 

Another easy question. 

“No! Of course not.” He presses close, desperately trying to make her feel better. She shouldn't think that, shouldn’t think that getting trained by him will make her a killer. “A broken hand is nothing Karen, he’ll be fine, you shouldn’t think like that.”

“Right. Of course not,” Karen says, her voice low. The shaking gets worse, taking her apart under his hand. She’s cracking, breaking down. Matt presses more insistently, trying to hold her together, trying to understand. 

Then he does. 

It’s like a bolt of lightening, like miscalculating a movement and catching a knife to the side. Horror claws at his throat, itching to get out. Foggy knew, he realizes. Foggy knew and sent Matt to deal with it because he knew Matt understood the horror, knew it like an old friend. They had talked about it while Matt lay on his couch, cut up and only just beyond death himself. Karen knows it too, apparently, and deeper. 

“Karen?” Matt asks, carefully. 

She must hear it in his voice. The muscles in her back bunch and stay that way, tense under his hand. Matt can’t move, can’t let her go until he realizes that his hand is fisted in her shirt, holding her still. He lets go like he’d been burned, dropping his hand down to hold hers instead. 

Karen takes in a shaking breath. She curls her hand around his much larger one, fingers not quite touching. Then it all comes pouring out between gasping breaths. The kidnapping, the gun, Wesley, cleaning up afterward, being haunted by Fisk. 

Matt listens, more and more angry as the explanation goes on. He hadn’t thought it was possible to hate Fisk more than he already did. It’s also the easiest part to deal with, to focus on. 

“Fisk is gone, Karen. He can’t hurt you now, he’s gone.” 

Karen shakes her head. “Is he? Sometimes it’s like...it’s like he can see me. I know he can’t but- I feel like he knows what I’m doing. Like we’re...doing things at the same time.” 

“Like you’re becoming him?” Matt asks, feeling sick to his stomach. 

He waits for her to say something, or to shake her head or nod, but she doesn’t. She doesn’t move at all. The familiar feeling of duty, of the responsibility to protect settles over him, and he grips her hand tighter, trying to ground her. 

“Karen, it’s ok,” Matt gentles, rubbing the pad of her hand with his thumb. It’s immediately clear that it’s not the right answer. 

“I don’t need you to do that. I don’t need you to sit here and act like- Do you think that the people you’ve hurt have never suffered? Some of them might have died Matt,” she throws back, suddenly vicious. “You don’t know.” 

Matt leans back like he’d been slapped. Karen sucks in a shocked breath. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have-”

“No,” Matt says, his voice like gravel in his ears. His throat hurts. “You’re...right. It’s possible.” 

“I just meant.” She shakes her head. “I didn’t think, I didn’t mean to.” 

“And I mean to hurt people all the time.” 

Karen is crying again, unable to speak. Her head moves back and forth, rhythmically. Matt raises his free hand to touch her and realizes he’s shaking too. Karen’s fingers touch his face, sliding across wet cheeks. Crying, then. He hadn’t realized. 

“Karen I- I tried to kill Fisk. I was planning on it.” 

She whines in the back of her throat. “It’s not a competition, Matt.” 

That startles a laugh out of him, but it’s a sickly sound, unfit for their surroundings. The church gardens are lovely, pure. Matt scrambles for their peace, holding on to the serenity it’s trying to give him. 

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness,” Matt recites, pulling it up from the bottom of his gut, taking the light from the much wider swath of darkness. “John 1:9.” 

Karen sighs. “I want that to mean something, I really do.” 

“It only work if you let it.” 

“Like therapy?” 

Matt laughs again, and it’s a better attempt. “Yeah, I guess.” 

“You wouldn't know? That doesn’t surprise me.” 

“I have my priest.” 

Karen chuckles, mouth closed, barely there. But Matt clings to it. She takes a long breath, holding it in before letting it back out. “Father Lantom seems like a good man.” 

“He is.” Matt hesitates, not wanting to create another explosion, but decides it’s too important to let go. “Did he help you?” 

“He tried. I think he knew more than he was letting on.” 

Matt nods. “He did the same to me.” 

“We talked about the sermon he gave the last time I was here. About the killer saints.” 

“Warrior saints.” 

Karen shrugs. “I looked them up. Found some interesting things. Did you know there’s a folk saint in mexico called Santa Muerte?”

Matt frowns. “Saint Death?” 

“She’s not a real Saint. The Church banned her. They say she’s a demon. But it doesn’t stop people from praying to her when they need help with things too terrible to tell to God. I’ve been thinking about her too, but she doesn’t seem any more real than the others.”

“The Saints were real people.” 

“Doesn’t that make them worse?” Karen shakes her head. “I read about them. The warrior saints, they were Christian soldiers in the Roman Army. They became popular during the Crusades. People loved them. I guess they still do.” 

“Yes.” 

“I just can’t help but think that it’s all just excuses. All we ever do is try to make these things ok, and they’re not. How can I- when I-” 

“You already are. You’re getting through it.” 

“Yes but that’s worse! Don’t you see? Fisk told me that it gets easier, and he was right.” 

Matt counts to ten in his head, making sense of Karen’s words in pieces, trying to understand. As far as he knows, Karen had never talked to Fisk. The wind blows through the garden, a life sign. “Did you mean to kill Wesley?” 

“I don’t think so. I meant to hurt him, I meant to get out.” 

“It’s- if you’re worried about retribution, I wouldn’t be. You were put into a situation against your will, and killed in defense of your own life.” 

“Is there a verse about that too?” 

“I think there’s a verse for just about everything. Which can make it pretty confusing, like Father Lantom said. Here I would say, ‘And if the avenger of blood pursues him, they shall not give up the manslayer into his hand, because he struck his neighbor unknowingly, and did not hate him in the past.’” 

“Which one is that?” 

“Does it matter?” Matt smiles. “It’s Joshua 20:1-9.” 

“You really know it. The bible, I mean.” 

“It helps.” 

“Well I guess it doesn’t hurt. I just can’t believe-” she cuts herself off, shaking her head. 

They sit in silence for a few long moments, just breathing. 

“Would you do it differently, if you could?”

“Yes,” Karen says, right away. “I would have- I still would have shot him, but just the once, just to get away. I didn’t want to die.” 

“Good.” Matt pulls her close. “That’s good.” 

“Are we going to be ok?” 

Matt turns the question over in his mind, pushing past the instinct to shy away from it. “I don’t know. That’s all I can- but I think that we have the best shot together.” 

Karen sucks in a watery breath. “And Foggy.” 

“Yeah that’s what I meant,” Matt says, some of the tension in his chest unwinding with just the mention of him. “Are you- do you think you’re ready to go?” 

Karen doesn’t answer, but she does stand up, taking Matt with her. They leave the garden together, slipping out the side door and heading back to their home, where Foggy is waiting. When they get there, he jumps up in a flurry of action and starts making them food, throwing together everything he can think of to make them better. 

Matt and Karen sit at the counter and let him talk, let him take care of them, on the outside looking in. He fixes that too, coming to stand in between them, wrapping his arms around Matt’s shoulders and Karen’s waist. They eat, then they sleep, all wrapped up together in the bed. Foggy puts himself at Karen’s back, holding Matt’s hand over her hip. Karen doesn’t talk, but she touches, telling them her pain and gratitude until they fall asleep, the wound finally open to the air. 

***

Later, Matt gives her a cross necklace. It’s a deceptively delicate chain, too thin for a man to wear, but the cross was his. He slides it over to her without ceremony, and she picks it up. 

“Got another quote for me?” Karen teases, a smile in her voice. 

Matt smiles. “Always. What about, ‘Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.’ John 15:13.”

“That sounds nice,” Karen says, her fingers tracing the cross. 

“I don’t know if you...even if you don’t believe in it, I think it can still help.”

Karen leans over kiss him. “If you think it will help, then it probably will.” 

Matt smiles and brings a hand up to the back of her neck, just resting, not pulling her in. Karen is the one to push, bringing them flush into a kiss. The contact hums, gradually building under their skin. Karen runs her tongue along the seam of Matt’s lips, urging him to open for her. He inhales sharply and complies, basking in the thrill of the physical. 

They’ve been moving so slowly as to be practically standing still, but at the same time they all but live together, the three of them intertwined every night, Matt and Karen walking side by side, Karen and Foggy in the bath together. Church. 

Karen isn’t a Catholic, and probably never will be. But she seems better, less likely to shatter. More inclined to wake them up when she cries. 

They break apart, breathing a little heavily. Matt smiles so wide it hurts. “Well?” 

“I’m ok. You?” 

“Ok. Let’s go find Foggy.” 

Karen giggles. “Think he deserves a kiss too?” 

Matt pulls her up and immediately back into his arms. “We all do.”

**Author's Note:**

> If a thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there shall be no bloodguilt for him. Exodus 22:2
> 
> follow me on tumblr for more nonsense (: paradiamond.tumblr.com


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